CLARA CITY — Power is expected to be restored yet this afternoon for Xcel Energy customers in the Clara City area.

According to Xcel’s outage page on www.xcelenergy.com, power could be restored around 5:30 p.m. to the 548 customers who have been without electricity since just before 9 a.m. this morning.

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Some businesses, including the City Hall, have generators and are open for business, according to Windy Block, city administrator. Students in the MACCRAY School District were released from school at 10:30 a.m. because of the outage.

The power line feeding electricity into the community went down, Block said, when workers were taking a building down in a demolition project and debris landed on a wire, causing the poles to fall.

According to Tom Hoen, Xcel Energy spokesman, a total of 806 customers in Clara City, Maynard and Sacred Heart were without power this morning. At 10:18 a.m., power was restored to 258 customers.

Gretchen Schlosser is the public safety reporter, and writes about agriculture occasionally, for the West Central Tribune. She's been with the Tribune since 2006 and has 17 years of experience working in news, media and communications.